Heel-nail plate



(No ModeL) I F. RRAYMOND, 2d.

HEEL NAIL PLATE. No. 315,069. I Patented Apr. 1 1885.

0 c2 uc Fig/L Fig. 5. W|TNE55E5 lNVENTUR UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

FREEBORN F. RAYMOND, 2D, OF NEWVTON, MASSACHUSETTS.

HEEL-NAIL PLATE.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 315,069, dated April '7, 1885.

Application filed January 13, 1855. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern..-

Be it known that I, FREEBORN F. RAYMOND, 2d, of Newton, in the county of Middlesex and State of Massachusetts, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Heel-Nail Plates, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, forming a part of this specification, in explaining its nature.

The invention relates to a comb-strip of heelnails. A heel-nail differs from all other nails in these particulars: First, it has no head; second, it has two surfaces which have a continuous taper or bevel from one end of the nail to the other; third, it has two surfaces which are parallel, and, fourth, it has no sharp point. Heretofore they have been cut from a flat nailplate of uniform thickness having the width of the nail to be desired. Of course this produces nails in bulk, and they are ordinarily placed in position for driving by hand in heel making and attaching operations, although there have been one or two attempts made to make machines to receive them in bulk, separate, arrange, and feed the same to skillets;

' but these machines are complicated and liable to get out of order, and are not adapted to the hard usage of shoe-factories.

Ihave ascertained that in order to make and automatically present, feed, and distribute nails ofthis character to heel nailing or attaching machines it is necessary that the heel-nails should be so arranged that their large and small ends shall always be upon the same lines, and that they be so connected with each other that they can be fed by the nails themselves with uniformity and precision. I have ascertained that the best form of obtaining this result is by means of a series or line of nails so formed or cut as to leave a connecting portion or margin; and I have further ascertained that in making such a strip it is desirable to use a nail-plate which is wide enough to form only one strip, and not attempt to form two strips therefrom, because by so doing I am enabled to obtain a straight and uniform strip with no waste, the portions of the plate punched or removed to form the strip making loose nails, which are salable as such.

Referring to the drawings, Figurel is a perspective view of a nail-plate. Fig. 2 is aperspective View of a comb-strip made therefrom Fig. 3 shows the complete nailer cut therefrom in making the comb. Fig. 4 is a view of a nail cut or severed from the comb, and Fig. 5 is an elevation of the nail.

To make the prepared plate, I use a plate, a, such as is ordinarily employed in the manufacture of heel-nailsthat is, a plate which is as wide as the nail which it is desired to make is long, and of uniform thickness throughout. This nail-plate is submitted to the action of a punch and die, whereby the portions a of the nail-plate are removed, leaving the blanks I) connected by the uncut portion 12 of the nailplate. This produces a comb strip, so called-that is, it is a series of partly-completed nailswhich are entirely finished by being severed from the strip. The partly-formed nails of this nai1-strip, it will be observed, taper on two sides, 0 o, from the point to the head-connecting portion of the strip, and they are separated at that point by a space sufficient only to permit the nail to be completed by being severed from the strip by the action of a suitable die or cutter; but while they taper on two sides they are of uniform thickness from end to endthat is, the two surfaces 0 c are parallel, so that when severed from the strip each nail has allthe characteristics of the ordinary shoe-nail-that is, it has no head, although one end is wider than the other-and it has the continuous incline or taper from that end to the point, and the two parallel surfaces like the ordinary cut heel-nails. The sections awhich are punched out form heel-nails of a smaller size, which are not connected. Of course it will be possible to form two strips or combs from each plate, if desired, by making the plate a trifle wider.

I am aware that it is not new to make what is known as a tack-strip -that is, astrip of lasting tacks or fastenings made from a thin flat plate, and having sharp points and a headconnecting portion, which is widened either by upsetting or by rolling, or by folding or bending over to form a lateral headforming section, or which has the shanks of the tacks or fastenings placed so far apart from each other as to leave a suitable head-formingportion between the shanks. Such tack-strips are described in patent to Blake, No. 131,082, dated September 3, 1872; to Fischer, N 0. 152,735, dated July 7, 1874, and also in his Patent No. 90,650, dated June 1, 1869, and in patent to Woodward, No. 183,616, dated October 24, 1876; but as none of these patents show or describe a line or series of heel-nails connected by an uncut margin of the same thickness as the remainder of the nail, and which is not used for forming heads thereto, I consider that they do not contain the features of my invention.

Having thus fully described my invention, I

claim and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States A heel-nail plate comprising the narrow section b of the plate, from which extend the nails b, having inclined surfaces 0 c and the paralr5 lel surfaces 0 0 all substantially as described.

FREEBORN F. RAYMOND, 2D. Witnesses:

-J. M. DOLAN,

FRED. B. DOLAN. 

